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Philippine-American War

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The Philippine Scouts, a unit of the American army blamed for mass killings and torture, stand in formation circa 1905.

How the Philippines Were Crucial to the Making of American Empire

The US has long had a brutal, domineering relationship with the Philippines. And crucially, it’s depended on the labor of colonized Filipinos themselves.
by Michael Brenes via Jacobin on August 13, 2021
A picture of a “water detail,” reportedly taken in May, 1901, in Sual, the Philippines. A man is holding another down while a third holds the captive's mouth open with a stick and pours water into it.

The Water Cure

Debating torture and counterinsurgency—a century ago.
by Paul A. Kramer via The New Yorker on February 18, 2008
A photograph of the massacre perpetrated by Americans taken on the morning of March 8, 1906, on the eastern crest of Bud Dajo.

A Notorious Photo From a US Massacre in the Philippines Reveals an Ugly Truth

A shocking image of the 1906 atrocity survived but failed to become a humanitarian touchstone.
by Kim A. Wagner via New Lines on June 17, 2024
Eilhu Root.

The Shameful Imperialist Legacy of Elihu Root, Godfather of Corporate Law

How a celebrated corporate lawyer named Elihu Root became the driving force behind some of the worst U.S. atrocities ever perpetrated abroad.
by Nathan Porceng via Balls And Strikes on March 8, 2023
President Biden meets with Philippines President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. in New York
partner

What Is Forgotten in the U.S.-Philippines Friendship

Fifty years after his father declared martial law, Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. was welcomed in New York.
by Adrian De Leon via Made By History on September 25, 2022
An American soldier guards a Japanese internment camp at Manzanar, Calif., on May 23, 1943.
partner

Is it Possible to Condemn One Empire Without Upholding Another?

The danger of making wars into moral crusades.
by Moon-Ho Jung via Made By History on May 22, 2022
Illustration of Asian woman surrounded by flowers

Sex, Death, and Empire: The Roots of Violence Against Asian Women

The line from America’s earliest empire in the Philippines to Japan, Korea, Vietnam—and anti-Asian violence at home—is straight, clear, and written in blood.
by Panthea Lee via The Nation on April 18, 2022
Drawing of Smedley Butler in front of a map background.

The Marine Who Turned Against U.S. Empire

What turned Smedley Butler into a critic of American foreign policy?
by Patrick Iber via The New Republic on January 11, 2022
President Duterte saluting at monument
partner

July Fourth is Independence Day for Two Countries. But for One It is Hollow.

For the Philippines, independence from the United States came with strings attached.
by Christopher Capozzola via Made By History on July 4, 2021
Militarized police and an armored car.

The Racist Origins of U.S. Policing

Modern policing is linked to overseas colonial projects of conquest, occupation, and rule. Demilitarization requires uprooting that worldview.
by Julian Go via Foreign Affairs on July 16, 2020

Yes, American Police Act Like Occupying Armies. They Literally Studied Their Tactics

The founders of modern policing quelled foreign uprisings. ‘Demilitarizing’ police will be harder than taking away their tanks.
by Stuart Schrader via The Guardian on June 8, 2020
Political cartoon of Uncle Sam as a teacher of children representing different ethnicities. European immigrants read studiously, new Caribbean and Pacific colonies resist, and Chinese, American Indian and African American children want to learn but are excluded.

The Long Shadow of White Supremacy in U.S. Foreign Policy

How to hide an empire, from the Spanish-American war to CIA-sponsored Latin American coups.
by Alex Langer via Erstwhile: A History Blog on April 29, 2020

How the United States Reinvented Empire

Americans tend to see their country as a nation-state, not an imperial power.
by Patrick Iber via The New Republic on February 12, 2019
Slave auction in the United States.

How a Group of 19th-Century Historians Helped Relativize the Violent Legacy of Slavery

On the scholarship and intellectual legacies of Ulrich Bonnell Phillips, William Dunning and other academics.
by Scott Spillman via Literary Hub on March 10, 2025
Theodore Roosevelt

The Threat Behind Trump’s Praise of McKinley & Roosevelt

The president says he wants to be peacemaker—but his heroes were warmongers.
by Ted Snider via The American Conservative on February 11, 2025
An illustration imagining Maura, an indigenous Filipino woman.

Searching for Maura

A Filipino woman died after coming to the U.S. to be put on display at the 1904 World's Fair. A Smithsonian anthropologist likely took part of her brain.
by Nicole Dungca, Claire Healy, Ren Galeno via Washington Post on August 16, 2023
Eugene Debs mug shots at the US Penitentiary in Atlanta.

War Fever

The crusade against civil liberties during World War I.
by Eric Foner via The Nation on February 7, 2023
Black and white photo of U.S. soldiers outside Manila during the Philippine-American War.

The Resounding Darkness of America’s Black Sites

It is in the hidden spaces of American empire that the realities of power can truly be seen.
by Jonathan M. Katz via The Baffler on January 10, 2022
A view of “Battleship Row” during or immediately after the Japanese raid on Dec. 7, 1941. The capsized USS Oklahoma (BB 37) is in the center, alongside the USS Maryland (BB 46).
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What We Forget When We ‘Remember Pearl Harbor’

Seeing the war from the perspective of citizens of U.S. colonies sheds new light on the impact of World War II.
by Eri Kitada via Made By History on December 7, 2021
Botanical drawing of a bunch of grapes.

Fruits of Empire

The plant explorers of the USDA succeeded in bringing the world’s fruits to American supermarkets. But at what human, ecological, and gustatory cost?
by Willa Glickman via New York Review of Books on November 12, 2021
Asian-American men waiting to be questioned by white police officers

Racism Has Always Been Part of the Asian American Experience

If we don’t understand the history of Asian exclusion, we cannot understand the racist hatred of the present.
by Mae Ngai via The Atlantic on April 21, 2021
Mountain landscape.

The Never-Ending Frontier?

The US imperialist wars in the Philippines, Korea, Vietnam, and Afghanistan grew from US wars against Indigenous people in the 19th century.
by Karl Jacoby via Public Books on February 9, 2021

A Crime by Any Name

The Trump administration’s commitment to deterring immigration through cruelty has made horrifying conditions in there inevitable.
by Adam Serwer via The Atlantic on July 3, 2019

‘Some Suburb of Hell’: America’s New Concentration Camp System

The longer a camp system stays open, the more likely it is that vital things will go wrong.
by Andrea Pitzer via New York Review of Books on June 21, 2019
Political Cartoon of Uncle Sam bringing shovels to McKinley who has one foot in the U.S. and the other in Panama, as American flags dot the globe.

The Large Policy

How the Spanish-American War laid the groundwork for American empire.
by Brenda Wineapple via The Nation on January 31, 2018

Talking God in the United States

What are Americans really talking about when they talk about religious freedom?
by Rachel Gordan via Los Angeles Review of Books on August 31, 2017
Poster for Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show.
partner

Where the Buffalo Roam

How Buffalo Bill’s Wild West brought scenes from the American West to audiences around the globe.
via BackStory on March 1, 2013

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